Tuesday, November 09, 2010

SNOWSTORM

Weather.com predicted a snowstorm. The snowstorm was to start tomorrow in New York City and continue for 3 days. As per the news channels, this was going to be the worse snowstorm of its kind. Zi was excited as she hadn’t seen a snowstorm ever before. But the fact that she could work from home for the next 3 days, excited her even more. She could evade the early morning rush of the New York Subways. She did not have to iron her clothes for tomorrow. She did not have to get dressed with 3 layers of clothing. The snowstorm actually brought a smile on her face. She kept idling her time by surfing through Facebook and other random sights. In no time she fell asleep.

She woke up next morning, a little later than usual as she did not have to travel. She prepared some green tea, scrambled eggs and toasted waffles for breakfast. She felt like having an elaborate breakfast as today was going to be a relaxed day. She sat right next to the window and sipped her tea and took a bite of the waffle.

From the sights outside, it was evident that it had snowed all night. The roads were covered with white snow and seemed extremely pristine. She had not seen such clean roads ever before. She could barely see any vehicles on these roads. She stayed at the 28th floor and all she could see was snow falling with a steady frequency. She could still see the Empire State building from her window. She wondered, if it would ever snow so much that the Empire State building would be buried under snow. Somewhere she secretly wished that it happened. She gazed at the steady stream of snowflakes. The snowflakes seemed to have a rhythm, a mesmerizing magic as they fell. It felt like a white pebble followed another one. In five minutes of staring at them, she could identify patterns in the way they fell. With each falling snowflake it seemed difficult for Zi to take her eyes off them. It had been an hour and she had not moved an inch from where she was. Soon she was resonating with the snowfall. Each snowflake seemed to connect with her life. Some snowflakes connected to the past, some to the present and some even to her future. Each snowflake unfolded a new story. She could never keep track of a single snowflake. She saw it and then it suddenly disappeared into the heap of snow. All she had was glimpses. She could not trace a snowflake to its start nor to its end. While the snowflakes seemed similar, they also seemed disjointed from one and another. All she knew was that the snowflakes would eventually melt. She wasn’t too happy about it. She stood there was hours as if the snowfall had hypnotized her. At times the snowfall become more ferocious than before, but that did not distract Zi. Observing and trying to trace through the snowstorm kept her involved.

Ten hours later the snowstorm stopped. Tears rolled down Zi’s eye. She stood right beside the window and bawled for hours.